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802.11n includes many new features to improve the quality of wireless connections, and increases both data rate, and range. The most significant new feature introduced in 802.11n is MIMO (multiple in, multiple out), which allows data to be sent out upon multiple streams on different antennas using the same frequency. The more data your router can squirt out, the better the odds your intended device will catch it, and yes, the recent resurgence of the Zune’s popularity has made squirting cool again.
Its also worth noting that even if your client device only supports 802.11g, if your access point is 802.11n, you will still see a great deal of benefit from the upgrade. In addition to the extended range, often times you are able to maintain 54 Mbps connections from much greater distances.
Wireless G routers are cheap, cheerful, and still by far the most common type of Wi-Fi available today, but switching to 802.11n is a major upgrade.
If you notice that your signal strength is decent one moment, and gone the next, you might have an interference problem from something else in your home. The most common offender is cordless phones. Most of the new cordless phone systems that you buy today operate in the 5.8GHz spectrum, but for several years 2.4 GHz was all the craze. Unfortunately, your Wi-Fi router is transmitting on this same frequency, and the two might be interfering with each other. Often times the interference, particularly from newer and more powerful 802.11n routers is so strong, you can actually hear a buzzing noise on the phone if you’re near a router that’s transmitting data. You will also notice that your signal strength, and transfer speeds will take a significant dive each time the phone rings.
If you do use 2.4GHz cordless phones your options are limited, but still pretty straightforward. You can spring for one of the newer 802.11n dual band Wi-Fi routers that transmit on the higher 5GHz spectrum, or you can buy 900Mhz, or 5.8Ghz cordless phones instead. Personally I stick to the 900MHz phones because they often give you the best range, and they won’t interfere with your Wi-Fi.
Microwave ovens have also been known to mess with Wi-Fi signals, but since they operate so infrequently, and are typically located far away from your wireless devices, this is usually a non-issue. The interference generated is typically limited to a range of no more than ten feet, but in some situations this might cause an issue for a kitchen PC or other nearby client device.
Wi-Fi is all about standards right? Sort of. The Wi-Fi logo ensures that all your hardware from different vendors will be compatible with each other, but many vendors add in additional code or components to try and one up the competition. Linksys for example has SpeedBooster technology that does a very respectable job of increasing the range and speed of devices that all contain this feature. Nearly every vendor offers something above and beyond, but don’t expect to see the benefits if you mix and match.
Most routers come configured out of the box to run at 100% power, but just in case, its worth checking. Under certain conditions you might actually choose to decrease your transmit power, particularly if your setting this up in a small office or condo. Turning a router up to full power to blanket your 800 square foot condo isn’t just pointless; it’s inconsiderate to your neighbors who will need to deal with the added wireless interference.
802.11g claims to offer 54Mbit/s, and in theory 802.11n is capable of speeds up to 600 Mbit/s. In reality, expect these values to be lower, much lower. As you have seen from the tips shown above, everything from walls to Microwaves can wreck havoc on your transfer speeds and range, don’t take it personally. Unless your willing to move to an isolated cabin in the middle of nowhere, and run all your wireless devices directly beside you router, be prepared to settle for speeds that are considerably less than what you might have read on the box.
Comments are closed on this article
nduanetesh
November 30, 2009 at 8:52pm
So, say I want to use another wireless router to expand the range of my current wireless network. Basically, I want to use a router as a repeater or range expander. The two routers will be too far apart to connect via an ethernet cable. Can this be done with a regular router? How would I set that up? Or do I need to buy a real "wireless range extender" (which, ironically, is more expensive than a router)?
Thanks for the help!
IFLATLINEI
October 06, 2009 at 2:53pm
As already stated this is nice for the novice but even still these guides are a dime a dozen. Maybe the article writer should have done a google search. He would have seen them all over the place. Not to mention most of this stuff can be found right at the manufacturers site.
The Ultimate router guide would have included so much more that you cant get anywhere else. Like actual test results for a number of different brands and models. It would cover things like how many consumer grade routers fail to follow your port forwarding instructions 100% of the time or that you can DMZ a PC or Console and still have ports blocked. Or how quickly these things are overloaded.
Funny how testers will tests the living crap out of a Processor, HDD, Ram, but put out junk like this for a router guide. Isnt it time to expose these router companies for what they really are? Show the consumer how and why wireless really isnt for what they think its for. Like gaming.
pfjaco
October 06, 2009 at 11:00am
Come on Guy's the easiest way to add more RJ45 ports is with a network switch you can get them up to 1 Ghz with 4,8,or12 ports, or more if you go with an enterprise unit; plug the uplink from the router into port 1 of the switch (or the link port if one is specified) and and you're good to go with no IP address hassels; you can even stick a WAP into the switch if you need another wireless point.
Justin.Kerr
October 07, 2009 at 9:25am
This is a "router guide" not switch guide, but yes using a switch would be easier.
I would however qualify that by saying going with a new switch won't save you any money, and is less versatile in the long run. Not only that, but your more likely to have a spare router kicking around from a previous upgrade than a spare switch.
thefuzz4
October 06, 2009 at 10:41am
Of cours in windows if your wondering what networks are around you for finding a clear channel you can use net stumbler.
But for us linux users out there I recently discovered a very awesome tool called kismet. Kismet will not only sniff out all of the wireless networks out there but through packet sniffing will also find out the names of your networks that are not broadcasting. I found a neighboor who was not broadcasting and also had their network wide open I couldn't believe they went the step of turning off the broadcast but didn't lock it down that was about useless. If your a linux user try out kismet it's a little tricky to get setup but one it is, it's awesome.
mrvander
October 06, 2009 at 9:37am
First off, good article. Articles like these are the reason I come to MaxPC.
You write contradictory statements though early on. You write,
"...but the trick to security is to always keep your attackers guessing. Many routers give you the ability to make the wireless network
invisible, but don’t bother with this feature. Setting your network to
invisible might keep people from accidentally latching on to your
connection, but anyone using the right tools can find it easily."So you say to always keep attackers guessing then in the very next breath, say to ignore a feature that adds yet another layer of "guessing. That's just silly. Of course, if you're securing your router and don't need to broadcast it, why not turn off broadcasting? You know the SSID and as you say, the trick is to keep the attackers guessing and each layer helps.
Turn off that broadcast and maybe your neighbors more visible router will be attacked and not yours.
Justin.Kerr
October 07, 2009 at 9:30am
My point was simply that it dosn't offer (any) security beneift, and isn't worth the hassle.
Keep them guessing at your password, not your SSID which is being broadcast in the clear even if you turn it off.
WarCrime342
October 06, 2009 at 3:22pm
If I may say I think the point he's trying to get at is that it's not worth the headache or the effort to make it invisible if an intruder just side-steps with a click of the mouse. I've had my fair share of devices that have issues connecting to invisible Wi-Fi networks and it's not very practical to put into use in order keep out a hacker. Having a password and MAC Authentication list would be enough to keep unwanted roamers from connecting.
UndeniablyPC
October 06, 2009 at 4:54am
This article is pretty much useless in regards to security IMO.
Yea, it does tell you to change the default password and does tell you that essentially that WPA2 is the only way to properly encrypt a wireless signal without compromising security, but it really doesn't provide ample coverage in regards to the actual firewall settings in order to lock the router down.
In the matters of the router firewall it fails in my opinion to talk about stateful packet inspection, and how to properly configure your ports to allow only specific types of traffic through. Yes, port forwarding and QoS are important features, but they do nothing when it comes to the actual security of the network.
Also, in the area of security they should have mentioned the fact that users should only have a certain number of IPs allocated to their internal network, i.e. if you are using only 3 computers, only give your network a grand total of three IPs. Also those IPs should be associated with the specific MAC addresses of those machines. This way if someone does happen to find the network, they are unable to obtain an IP on the network. These steps are prudent when you are dealing with both a DHCP and static IP architecture. IMO.
But, I will digress and give you guys credit where it is due, as this guide will help the novice get a little better understanding in regards to the settings of their router.
Saltboy
October 06, 2009 at 5:34am
Spoofing a MAC address is a cake walk. It really is a waste of time as that is the first thing a person that knows what they are doing tries. Right now, WPA2 is about all that is useful for keeping folks off your network.
Justin.Kerr
October 07, 2009 at 9:37am
If Mac address filtering is your only means of security, it's not enough, and is easily defeated. On the other hand if you have a strong WPA2 implementation, this is an unnecessary step. To each their own.
ironorr
October 06, 2009 at 12:17am
A really easy way to find out what WiFi channels your neighbors are using is to use this command in Windows:
cmd /k netsh wlan show networks mode=bssid
It's not as pretty as the GUI example you showed, but it gets the job done quickly.
whr4usa
October 05, 2009 at 10:30pm
potentially extremely useful article as per usual MaxPC!
noticed a couple errors on terms and grammar (I agree with first poster Lolz)
W-LAN, WiFiLan OR WLAN but not just WAN
wireless networks are still Local Area Networks but a WAN is a Wide Area Network is owned and maintained by a single ISP (usually) even if its resources (bandwidth, server clusters etc.) are shared or contracted out
you won't find any accurate home wireless networking information by googling (...or Binging) 'WAN'
also a router having a DHCP server has little to do with sharing an Internet connection (ICS or NAT ring a bell..?) 192.168.0.x & 192.168.1.x are Class C Private IP addresses which esidential routers won't route, they just get looped/broadcast back across the network from which the original signal came which can eat up bandwidth at regular intervals, hence the reason for including a DHCP server for efficiency and better management but not in any way enabling the sharing of that priceless Internet connection
one more 'also' lol to implement that router stacking solution you must or rather 'should' (network appliances keep getting smarter so what do I know anyways?) set the gateway in each of the stacked routers to the static IP of the router closer to the Internet than them in terms of wiring or physical connections so that the Internet connection is directly processed instead of adding overhead to the routing firmware (this assumed you plugged the more distant routers into each closer router's main port labeled "Internet" (usually, aka physical residential gateway port)
confuse anybody yet?
ironorr
October 06, 2009 at 12:37am
Yeah, I'm guessing you will confuse many people with that garbled mess. Jesus. Did you even read that before you posted it? Do you not feel like a total hypocrite for commenting on the author's grammar?
whr4usa
September 09, 2010 at 1:04pm
I apologize for my poor spelling & typing
grammar is fine though!!
DBsantos77
October 05, 2009 at 10:04pm
I'm actually very surprised to see so many networks using WEP.I'm also surprised that devices like the Nintendo DS Lite vI require a WEP password for online play..
-Santos
lunchbox73
October 06, 2009 at 7:18am
That was a good reminder for me. I had to downgrade to WEP a couple of years ago when I bought a DS for my kid's xmas gift. Now that they don't use it any more I can ratchet back up to WPA2.
